


shades of night

by izayoi_no_mikoto



Category: Tokyo Babylon, X -エックス- | X/1999
Genre: Angst, Dreams and Nightmares, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Nonnies Made Me Do It, Trauma, Unhealthy Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-08
Updated: 2017-12-08
Packaged: 2019-02-14 07:29:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13002843
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/izayoi_no_mikoto/pseuds/izayoi_no_mikoto
Summary: Even now, even after everything, Subaru can't stop himself from dreaming about Seishirou.





	shades of night

**Author's Note:**

> Contains spoilers for everything about Subaru and Seishirou.

Subaru shot upright with a gasp.  
  
He gulped for air, his eyes darting about, his entire body strung taut.  Sweat plastered his bangs to his forehead.  For a moment, a bare heartbeat, there was nothing but darkness and panic and the desperate sound of his own ragged breathing.  But then his vision adjusted, his reeling mind returned to wakefulness, and the world settled into place, as docilely as though it had never even wobbled.  
  
The clock beside his bed read 4:51, red numbers glowing angrily in the predawn dimness.  
  
Subaru closed his eyes.  His panting slowed, by fits and starts, until his breathing was only slightly shaky.  He noticed, distantly, that his hands were clenching the clammy sheets as though trying to rend them apart; he pried his fingers open and pressed them flat against the mattress instead, and ignored the way they trembled.  
  
_"Subaru-kun."_  
  
Subaru shivered.  
  
He should have known.  From the moment Seishirou appeared, he should have known it was a dream.  
  
Subaru inhaled, exhaled.  Slowly.  He raked his damp hair away from his face.  _A dream_ , his treacherous mind whispered, _just a dream._  
  
He didn't dream of Seishirou every night, but when he did, it always started the same way.  It started with them facing each other, and Seishirou smiling, and Subaru prepared to die, waiting to die, _ready_ to--  
  
They all started the same way, but they didn't all end the same way.  Sometimes Subaru dreamt of what should have been, Seishirou's hand plunging through his chest and gripping his heart the way no one else ever could.  Sometimes he dreamt that no one died, and Seishirou reached out and touched his cheek with gentle fingers and a concerned expression and for the first time in his life _meant_ it.  Sometimes Subaru dreamt that the world ended right then and there, that the earth cracked open beneath them and swallowed them both whole, together.  But most of the time, his dreams were merely a reflection of reality, and he again and again felt the slick warmth of Seishirou's dying blood on his hand, and the puff of Seishirou's dying breath on his cheek, and the soft murmur of Seishirou's dying words as he leaned forward and whispered--  
  
Subaru closed his eyes and swallowed.  
  
He'd killed Seishirou in his dreams tonight, too.  But this time, in this dream, Seishirou had leaned forward and whispered, "Subaru-kun, I never told you--"  
  
And then his words had stopped, and his breath.  
  
_...Just a dream_ , his mind whispered, again.  
  
Subaru pressed one hand to his suddenly throbbing eye and curled in on himself, his face buried in his bent knees.  "Seishirou-san," he said to no one, weak and brittle and crumbling, the words a plea that he was powerless to control.  
  
Even now, even after everything, he couldn't stop himself from dreaming about Seishirou.  Couldn't stop his heart from clenching every time he saw Seishirou, crystal clear, in his mind's eye.  Couldn't stop Seishirou's voice from echoing in his memory, as close and real as if the man were sitting right there next to him.  
  
_I never told you,_ the Seishirou of his dreams said, a traitor to the truth.  
  
"I wish you'd never told me," Subaru whispered, his cracking voice filling the darkness.

**Author's Note:**

> (Inspired by the dialogue prompt: "I never told you--")


End file.
